How do I network on wireless thoughout my house?

Ok here is my problem. We have 4 computers in the house, and 2 of the 4 are on wireless. We just bought Netgears wireless system for the laptop and the upstairs computers. The other 2 in the office downstairs is wired direct to the router. I can only print from the main one, but when the wife is on her computer, she has to send me an e-mail to print something up for her. I have tried to use the XP networking wizard, but it never seems to work correctly. We also have PC anywhere on all the computers but I would think XP would be better for this? Anyways I also want to be able to transfer files from any computer in the house to any other computer in the house.
Thanks in advance everyone

the most important information in this situation is - Are you on XP Pro (for all)? Or XP Home (for all)? Or is it a mixture?

This is one of the reasons you pay extra for Pro - M$ have crippled the networking in Home. Also you will probably want to be running SP2 level for them. There are guides and other threads to research on this....

Assuming you have pro my advice is to disable simple file sharing everywhere and then use your share's security tab to enable guest access everywhere - once that is done you are good to go (can only do this in Pro of course).

Not really I'm afraid - but it is good news that the majority are Pro - they will all fully share fine - there is even a workaround for remote dektoping with SP2 posted somewhere on here if you want to go the whole hog.....

You could either shell out for a Pro upgrade to the Home machine (be careful though, sometimes OEM pro works out cheaper ) or you can workaround the problems you find with your home machine by copying stuff to it's "Shared Documents" Folder - which should still work.

At this point probably best to try the things I have pointed out then post back if you hit any issues for specific troubleshooting....

Hold on. You don't need XP Pro for just a simple workgroup-based network like this. I have two machines running Pro and one using an OEM Home version, and all of them network just fine together for file and printer sharing.

@Mazspeed: Regarding your problem of sharing files and folders: First, you need to make sure the required folders are being shared on the host machines. Right click all the folders you want to share, select "Sharing and Security" and fill in a name for the network share. Make sure you check the second box if you want to allow other machines to write to the folder.

Now go to the guest machine, open up Windows Explorer, and type in the UNC path to the network share in your location box. For example, if a folder is being shared with the name "Shared" on the computer named "Box1", you'll need to enter this:
\\Box1\Shared
If that doesn't work, replace "Box1" with the IP address of "Box1" and see if that works (eg: \\192.168.1.3\Shared). Once you're able to get file/folder sharing working, we'll move on to printer sharing.

But again, don't spend the extra cash on XP Pro unless you need some of the other features in it - it is not necessary for workgroup-based sharing.

Like I mentioned, in Explorer, right click the folder you want to share on the network and select "Sharing and Security" (or Properties, and then the Sharing tab)
If it's the first time you're doing it, you might see a security warning in the box. Click that, and don't select the wizard option.

Just to clear things up here against people bashing home and networking. I own home, infact i love home does everything I want it to. I have 7 computer networked, and never had so much a hiccup from any of the software/hardware. Please stop bashing home!

No probs man.
For printer sharing, we'll need a few more details. How is the printer connected? Is it directly plugged into one of the desktop machines via USB? Is it connected to a print server attached to the router?

Gowcra said:

Just to clear things up here against people bashing home and networking. I own home, infact i love home does everything I want it to. I have 7 computer networked, and never had so much a hiccup from any of the software/hardware. Please stop bashing home!

Hey NetRyder. It keeps giving me this error message. "Windows cannot connect to the printer. Either the printer name was typed incorrectly, or the specified printer has lost connection to the server"
I do have a a Netgear wireless router, keep that in mind.

Hey NetRyder. It keeps giving me this error message. "Windows cannot connect to the printer. Either the printer name was typed incorrectly, or the specified printer has lost connection to the server"
I do have a a Netgear wireless router, keep that in mind.

Thanks again for the help.
Let me know whatelse I can do.

Mike

Click to expand...

When typing in the UNC path, did you enter the hostname of the host machine, or the IP address (i.e., did you enter something like \\Box1\Printer or \\192.168.1.3\Printer)? If you used the hostname, try again using the IP address this time.

Also, do you have a software firewall installed or Windows Firewall enabled on the host and guest machines? If so, try adding the printer again using the same method after disabling the firewall on both machines.

How do I find the IP address? I entered like you displayed "\\Box1\Printer". I have just the windows sp2 firewall. But I also use Wedroot's "Spy sweeper"

I really appreciate your persistence in helping me out. I run a car forum, and have always thought highly of people going way out of there way to help out someone with a question. Thank you for your help so far. To all of you.

To find out your internal LAN IP, just open a command prompt (Start>Run) and type in ipconfig. You'll see a list of all your network connections. Look for the one that's associated with your ethernet card and look for the IP address under that.
An alternative way is to open up Network Connections from Control Panel and double click the connection. Your IP address is listed under the "Support" tab.

So basically, you want to find out the IP address of the computer that the printer is physically connected to. Once you have that, use it instead of the hostname when looking for the printer on the guest machines.

I'm going to sleep in a little while, so if the above method doesn't work, try temporarily disabling the Windows Firewall on the host and guest machines, and let me know if it works. I'll check back tomorrow.